Discussions By Condition: I cannot get a diagnosis.

pediatric eosinophilia, low grade fever, & stomach pain

My 8 year old daughter has been sick for over 3 years now. It started with what was a positive strep throat culture, then scarlett fever, then mononucleosis. After she was treated for all and "cured" we noticed that she was loosing her hair. It started as one bald spot behind her ear, then one on top of her head. We immediately sought an answer and was told that she had Alopecia Areata - an autoimmune disease. This could not be "cured" so e decided against steriod treament because my daughter was only 4 at the time. Then she started to become chronically fatigued and took on a grayish tone to her skin with sunken eyes, and had a low grade fever for over a week. Mono was negative, strep was negative, everything was in order - doctors told us that she was just "recovering". As the months passed my daughter could not go to preschool because she was just too tired and sickly. We finally moved to a bigger city and switched pediatricians. When we told the new pediatrican about the symptoms - low grade fever for over a month, stomach pain, headaches, fatigue, they immediately did blood work and found her eosinophil count was 3,100 and her IGE levels we also extremely elevated. They did stool samples for parasites and it came back negative. We were then sent to a rheumatologist, oncologist, immunologist, allergist, etc. All indications of any cancer and allergies were ruled out. However, the immunologist repeated the blood work and tested for parasitic infection via blood. This came back positive for toxicara and strongyloides. Finally we felt like we had a diagnosis. Treatment was began - Ivermectin and Albendazole. Three months later blood levels returned to normal and daughter seemed fine. One year later - same symptoms and extreme abdominal pain and headache. Blood work said eosinophilia - doctor did not even test for parasites again but was informed by a infectious disease doctor that it looked like a recurrent parasite infection and to treat again. My daughter seemed to recover. That was almost exactly 1 year ago to the day and now it has started again. My daughter had the flu that was going around school, tested positive for strep, begain antibiotics. We assumed that she would improve with the antibiotics but she has not. She is again troubled with extreme stomach pain (sometimes doubled over), headaches, fatigue (sleeping 16 hours a day), and low grade fever of around 99.6 for over a week. Blood work again says high eosinophils and high IGE. Please help...anyone else with same symptoms or diagnosis????

2 Replies:

DIAGNOSIS confirmed: Dientamoeba Fragilis - an intestinal parasite. She is being treated with Iodoquinol - 10mg twice a day for 20 days. Hope this helps someone that may have the same symptoms. This is her 3rd parasite in two years. None of my other children have ever had any of the parasites, so we are looking into an autoimmune response.